What a weekend

Sunday evening after a full on weekend and I'm shattered and really not ready for the "working week" to start again tomorrow morning; sadly it is actually going to be a really busy one in the paid work as well so I had best get a good night sleep tonight! I did sleep well last night which was good, but more of that later.

As you are so obviously aware as you were clawing at your computer screens wondering where I was, there was no update yesterday. It just really didn't strike me as something I wanted to do in the evening and not that much had happened anyway to talk about. However this update begins the night before that when the storm was banging all around us. Actually, less banging and more flashing. It was on all sides but never over head but we did get a little smattering of rain which was nice as it settled the dust out of the air. It was much cooler in the night as well which helped and we both slept pretty well.

About to get cracking on the tiling again

We woke as normal, with Louise waking up A and he taking her out for her morning toilet and then this time I encouraged her to come back to bed which was really nice. It wasn't much of a lie in but better than normal. We had been invited to go to Greece on Sunday with The Other Brother and the guy we had met over there the other week who is going back to his home in Europe on Monday so we cracked on first thing with the tiling. We really want to be moved back in there by the time the parents arrive and so getting the major part of it done was imperative this weekend. A did the first batch of tiling while I did something else, I can't remember what now.

A word on how we do the tiling. To mix the teracol we have worked out is more efficient if one person is mixing while the other pours the dry into the water. Because of the weight of the bags we have worked out that A should operate the mixer. Here she is hard at work. She loves it. And another word on how amazing A is. She is getting so stuck in to this whole process, coping with the complete lack of water, the dust and dirt and mess and clutter of living on a building site where things keep having to be moved and it feels like you can never really settle down. She's amazing and I don't say it enough on here but I think it every day.

The morning passed in tiling and me starting to paint the doors however the paint brush was rubbish and the roller we had was not for gloss so I only did the one coat and I don't seem to have taken any pictures of the result at all. By lunch time we had just about got past half of the floor done but with us heading out for the local yearly open day in our town it was clear that we would not get to Greece on Sunday. We were both pretty exhausted and so first A went for a lie down and then when I finished the final bit of tiling I was on with I went through, sat on the edge of the bed, and collapsed into sleep.

A monument for something, in our local town

When I woke later A had gone then she appeared having had a shower and nagged and bullied me into waking up and getting moving. I was really struggling and still mainly asleep while we got ready (I had a lovely wash outside in the barrel again) and then A drove us down in Lucy. When we got there the place was not very busy so we strolled around for a bit and I was able to get some of the flipflops that I like the most so that's good. We then settled down for a beer and to wait for SandS who were going to join us. I had forgotten the phone however we caught sight of them walking along so were able to meet up anyway.

SandS can't wait to get stuck in

We stayed settled in that table for a while as a foursome and had dinner (A had eaten a kebab when we got to town though I was still too tired to eat) which was a lovely chicken that had been BBQd and a quarter of a loaf of bread each. It was super tasty. After eating we had another stroll around (I got some more shorts) and then we waved goodbye to SandS and settled ourselves at a new table for a final beer. The music was just starting and the crowds were beginning to gather and we were slightly unsure how much longer we would stay but it turned out we were both pretty much ready to leave.

After seeing the friend of our neighbours and apologising for missing the Greece trip, and waving at the family who own the builders merchant we use, we headed back home feeling pretty tired. We went straight out onto the balcony when we got back and lay down in the sun listening to the music from the town. I was in no mood (as I said earlier) to write anything so I just decided to not bother and once we went in from the balcony I went straight to bed.

Louise jumping onto A's lap

I slept right through but A apparently struggled with the noise of the party in the valley. I must have been totally battered as normally I'm the one that it wakes up. Our morning took a normal pattern this morning with brews on the balcony (still mist in the valley and a fair few clouds around which kept it nice and cool) before we got cracking with our super busy day.

Man at work

Before we did anything we got a big mix going and I got myself into the routine of tiling. I had decided that I enjoyed the tiling process and should finish the job off and as I was also a little quicker A agreed so off I went. It felt good and I was able to move quite quickly, though remaining careful. There are still some spacers stuck in the gaps from the first day we started which was a mistake as now I can't move them at all, but mainly I was reusing the spacers quite regularly as each row was completed.

A pile of stuff that needed sorting

While I was doing this A set to clearing out the second guest room which had devolved into quite a mess over the past few weeks. We are going to be putting the single bed into here before the parents arrive as well which means it needs to be cleared out. This was quite a task as you can see and she just set herself to shifting on thing then the next thing and slowly the mess moved from here to other places.

So much better now she's tidied it all

When I ran out of mix we took a pause and headed into town for our shopping. We were trying to find some catches for the double doors Sally is making, as well as some gloss rollers and other bits, and a food shop. It was an expensive trip but we got everything on our list (but not everything we needed as we forgot a few bits) and headed back for lunch. I was hungry but A wasn't so I made some tuna mayo on toast and left her a bit for when she had fed Rambo. Then it was both of us back to the task at hand, her cleaning the guest room and me tiling with another huge load of mortar. A finished her task first and now the room is clean and organised which is a big improvement.

All of the whole tiles have been laid

I carried on and went through another couple of containers of teracol and by about 4pm I finally laid the last tile for this part of the job. I think we've done a pretty good job, for never having ever laid a single tile before between us however it is slightly out (about 5mm) as you approach the doorway which is really annoying. It isn't very noticeable and we'll probably pick a dark grout so it is disguised a bit by that. The next steps involve cutting tiles which is quite scary so I'll be asking Bekir for a hand with that if he gets time.

White gloss onto our bedroom door

A had gone on to her next task by then which was putting the next coat on the doorways and the new roller really made a big difference. She managed to get both the guest room door and our door done with its second coat and now there'll just need to be one more done and they're complete. We also have some nice colours to add to bits of the door as highlights so that'll be done this week as well.

Old windows and other waste wood to the bonfire

I was pretty shattered by this point, and so was A, but we kept at it and I dragged myself back outside, hauled the trailer round 180 degrees so I could hitch it, and slowly manhandled all the rough wood stacked in front of the green building, mainly old windows, into the trailer. I was certainly not moving fast and it made me think of what A had said earlier about understanding why Bulgarians move so slowly. I had a second stop to make with the trailer on the way up to the top bank and I declined to unload it today. The girls had come with me which was really nice as they road in the truck on my lap.

Really nommy dinner

And so, battered, I headed inside and found that A was just finishing the painting and had already put dinner in the oven. I had time to do a couple of paragraphs on this before she was serving up an outstanding pork chop dinner with lovely spicy  tatties (thanks CJC for the Naga Chili Salt!) and mushroom and onions and pepper. We ate it sat on the balcony and marveled once more at the life we are leading. We've been so much luckier with the weather this year than last and today being cooler (though it is now heating up as we get to near 7.30pm as the clouds have all gone and the sun is beating down) has been a pleasure.

We may need to buy Kaufland's whole stock

I've typed this up early enough that today I can help with the watering round which is really good. We bought two more plants from Kaufland today one of which is actually a fly catcher which is a really good thing. It also looks amazing and fits our colourscheme for the guest suites. The second plant is actually tree that was 95% reduced because it was dying so I grabbed it anyway. It is a Japenese willow and if it survives it will be absolutely beautiful.

So I'm going to get these pictures put into the blog and drink my tea and then later maybe we'll watch a film before bed. Cheers for reading.